Will the Gov't every be run like an efficient business?

B D · 03:46 PM

Why can't the elected officials of this country run the Government like they would a business, only spending what they have and making smart economic decisions? This is neither a Democrat nor Republican issue.

The greatest example of how inefficient the Government is the United States Postal Service. Here's an agency which should be run just like a business, obviously their business is delivering packages. But with an infrastructure in place already setup to deliver envelopes (flat packages) to every door six days a week they still have competitive rivals to pick up and deliver packages. They can't beat them with price, service and/or convenience even though they are already driving to every doorstep in the nation daily. If they were efficient there would never be a need for a UPS or FedEX. They have the tools and infrastructure but lack the direction or insight to make the government some money.

The other is the school system over 50% of the CA state budget goes to funding the K-12 schools, community colleges, and the UC and CSU systems. That's a huge budget to work with, but guess what school districts and teachers just complain that the Governor cut funds. Instead they should be raising all hell that the system they work for is inefficient and they need to reanalyze their budget now!

Hugh R · 09-20-2005, 05:10 PM

Its the difference between an expense center, and a profit center. Except this expense center doesn't have a spending cap, it seems. I'm a republican and it sickens me how much money this administration is blowing. I'll give Clinton credit for one think, he actually started to pay off the National Debt.

RickM · RickM's Garage

I think a good place to start the research is at the local level. Some of the people making the decisions are bored housewives, people who couldn't make it in the business arena and others who are elected on a slick poster or popular/familiar name. Many times with no regard to proven credentials or track record.

B D · 09-20-2005, 05:56 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by RickM
I think a good place to start the research is at the local level. Some of the people making the decisions are bored housewives, people who couldn't make it in the business arena and others who are elected on a slick poster or popular/familiar name. Many times with no regard to proven credentials or track record.

True, but that's also the only place you can find a honest politician and not a bunch of one party zombies.

Kevin Powers · 09-21-2005, 04:53 AM

oh yes!!! as soon as the ceo is shown the door.

k

lendaddy · 09-21-2005, 05:28 AM

No, never.

gaijindabe · 09-21-2005, 05:31 AM

"Nobody spends somebody else's money as carefully as he spends his own. Nobody uses somebody else's resources as carefully as he uses his own. So if you want efficiency and effectiveness, if you want knowledge to be properly utilized, you have to do it through the means of private property."

Milton Friedman

IROC · IROC's Garage

Wasn't this what Ross Perot was proposing?

1967 R50/2 · 09-21-2005, 06:20 AM

The gov't will never be run "Efficiently".

The founding fathers planned it that way. A strong central, government was what they were trying to get away from. The checks and balances that they put in place to curb missuse of power, basically guarantee a certain amount of inefficiency.

So much the better if you ask me.

Jims5543 · 09-21-2005, 06:26 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by IROC
Wasn't this what Ross Perot was proposing?

Exactly what I was thinking. My cousin and his wife campaigned for the first time in their life for him... and the last time. I don't think they even vote anymore. They were crushed that no one took Mr. Perot seriously.

Rikao4 · 09-21-2005, 06:33 AM

Why? because it makes sense..so let's not do something that could work better than this comedy.I know that if some of these clowns worked for me or my Co. tsk..the door would come fast. You know a few years from now someone is going to ask about those silly billions we spent for Katrina, what did you all do with it?..ah,we will get back to you, we have to go and look .
Rika

vash · vash's Garage

no, never ever.

think about it. some dept gets a budget, they HAVE to spend everything in order not to get the budget reduced at the next allotment.

my co-worker does the accounts payouts for my office. he sweet talks a vendor, and the guy gives us a 20% discount. so just because the amount doesnt match the pre-approved amount the payout gets rejected.

gov is stupid. red tape is a beotch.

Superman · 09-21-2005, 12:36 PM

A government might be run like an efficient government, but if you question is whether they will be run like an efficient business, the answer is an obvious "no." they are different kinds of organizations. There are things that efficient businesses do that you would not be pleased to find your public agencies doing.

The post office is a good example. Like with telephone deregulation, private business "skimmed" the market. I recall the day when theprivate attorneys pretended like the FCC outwitted them but in reality the market that was opened to them was the long distance market (very profitable) and the market left to the public (for a time anyway) was local access (high cost, low revenue).

With the movement of packages, the same has occurred. Let's ask the question another way. If we were to privatize letter handling, what do you think are the chances that for $0.37 you can get a letter delivered a hundred miles away the next day with almost complete reliability. It's 1:00 pm here right now. If I call a business in Everett (70 miles north) and ask them to send me an application today, I can be pretty confident it will be sitting in my mail box at home (25 miles south) when I return from work tomorrow. For thirty-seven cents.

Okay, and one more time I am going to remind you guys that while it's really fun to pretend to be brilliant by pointing at your perceptions of inefficiency in gubmint, sometimes those perceived problems become les nonsensical once you have looked more carefully into how and why a particular organization operates the way it does. And I will also remind you that government is not "them." Government is "us." You are part-owner. As my generation used to say, "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem." Lots of things in this world are head-scratchers, until you learn more about why they are the way they are. And in the case of government, you have a duty to do this. And if you do not, then I'm not going to give you brilliance-points for your opinion of how screwed up things appear to you.

Mulhollanddose · 09-21-2005, 12:44 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Hugh R
I'll give Clinton credit for one think, he actually started to pay off the National Debt.

There was deficit reduction, not debt reduction...The deficit reduction came at the price of a weakened military.

lendaddy · 09-21-2005, 01:07 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Superman
A government might be run like an efficient government, but if you question is whether they will be run like an efficient business, the answer is an obvious "no." they are different kinds of organizations. There are things that efficient businesses do that you would not be pleased to find your public agencies doing.

The post office is a good example. Like with telephone deregulation, private business "skimmed" the market. I recall the day when theprivate attorneys pretended like the FCC outwitted them but in reality the market that was opened to them was the long distance market (very profitable) and the market left to the public (for a time anyway) was local access (high cost, low revenue).

With the movement of packages, the same has occurred. Let's ask the question another way. If we were to privatize letter handling, what do you think are the chances that for $0.37 you can get a letter delivered a hundred miles away the next day with almost complete reliability. It's 1:00 pm here right now. If I call a business in Everett (70 miles north) and ask them to send me an application today, I can be pretty confident it will be sitting in my mail box at home (25 miles south) when I return from work tomorrow. For thirty-seven cents.

Okay, and one more time I am going to remind you guys that while it's really fun to pretend to be brilliant by pointing at your perceptions of inefficiency in gubmint, sometimes those perceived problems become les nonsensical once you have looked more carefully into how and why a particular organization operates the way it does. And I will also remind you that government is not "them." Government is "us." You are part-owner. As my generation used to say, "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem." Lots of things in this world are head-scratchers, until you learn more about why they are the way they are. And in the case of government, you have a duty to do this. And if you do not, then I'm not going to give you brilliance-points for your opinion of how screwed up things appear to you.

Uh,

Any private business man would be giddy with the idea of delivering an average of 10-12 letters every 20-30 second for a revenue per driver of $700-$800 per hour per driver. Now lets talk bulk delivery to PO boxes, sweet mother! Yes Sup a private business would suck your greasy monkey dong for that gig. Why do you think it's illegal? Yet they turn a loss over and over

Superman · 09-21-2005, 02:59 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by lendaddy
Uh,

Any private business man would be giddy with the idea of delivering an average of 10-12 letters every 20-30 second for a revenue per driver of $700-$800 per hour per driver. Now lets talk bulk delivery to PO boxes, sweet mother! Yes Sup a private business would suck your greasy monkey dong for that gig. Why do you think it's illegal? Yet they turn a loss over and over

No doubt about that. If a letter carrier actually delivered 10-12 letters every 20-30 seconds. And if that's all that needed to happen to a letter. But first, a driver needs to gather those letters, a staff of folks need to sort those letters, then place them in the appropriate trucks, the truck needs to make its deliveries, another sorting occurs at you local PO, and then the letter carrier gets them. And again, all this happens in a day, usually. It's like thirty-seven cents for overnight delivery service within a hundred miles. Across the nation delivery, at thirty-seven cents, usually takes just 2-3 days. Your beloved private companies are charging a dozen dollars for similar service.

And if a letter carrier delivered 12 pieces of mail every 20 seconds he or she would need a mail bag that can hold 17,280 pieces of mail. Some pieces of mail are larger than a standard envelope. Pretty athletic letter carrier, I'd say.

304065 · 09-21-2005, 03:19 PM

Short answer: Government will never be run the same way as a business, because when Government fails, it doesn't go out of business.

Where's the incentive for more efficient utilization of worker time, salaries, resources? Where's the drive to enhance productivity and improve services? When your "revenue" is the taxing power, and where it is illegal for the "consumer" of government services to "vote with her wallet" and "opt out" of having her wealth conscripted for the politicians pork projects, where is the incentive to consume less?

Unfortunately the desire for self-aggrandizement that is present in all human beings doesn't stop when the Government is paying the tab. Accordingly, the inherent tendency for empire building runs amok.

The ONLY example of efficiency of government that I have seen in my lifetime is when Mayor Mike Bloomberg consolidated all of the City's 4000 service telephone numbers and 40 call centers into a single 3-1-1. This way, he could measure how many calls they were actually getting and try to allocate resources accordingly. He also deployed Siebel/Interwoven CRM software to help the process.

Our City, BTW, has an annual operating budget of around $40 Billion. Services are excellent, if you remember the problems of the Dinkins Administration.

Pop quiz: What did Bloomberg do before he was Mayor?

Superman · 09-22-2005, 08:41 AM

Indeed, as John says, government will never be run like a business. They are structured differently, for a variety of reasons. John mentions that competition is missing in the public sector and this is largely true. Absence of incentives are often mentioned. That is, the absence of the kinds of incentives present in profit-making organizations.

As I've mentioned before, I've seen public sector workers whose motivation is arguably even more forceful than the job security/wage earnings motivation existant in the private sector. Some public sector workers feel very strongly about the mission they pursue. Safety regulation folks, for example, feel they are saving lives. Many public offices have missions that protect workers, or protect citizens from fraud or other harm.

And often times "accoutability" is mentioned. Well, here I respect the notion but in some ways reject the argument. We are the stakeholders (public agencies don't have stockholders) in those organizations, and the public IS the oversight. Auditor offices exist in the public sector to help ensure agencies are being responsible with your tax dollars. That's another mission that an individual public auditor can feel motivated about. I personally know several folks who work for the Washington State Auditor's Office, and that is what I find. That office practices the UTMOST in professional integrity and they're also not afraid to point at an agency's practices, even from a macro perspective, and call "bull*****."

And yes, talented managers like John describes, Mayor Mike Bloomberg, are sorely needed in public sector organizations. Maybe we should consider what it might take to get this kind of talent where it is clearly needed the most.

gaijindabe · 09-22-2005, 08:51 AM

Govenment needs to pay more to attract top-level talent. I am amazed how little department heads in New York City government make. These folks have zillion dollar budgets and manage thousands of people and make MUCH less than the private sector.

Superman · 09-22-2005, 10:14 AM

That's my point. Public sector folks make decisions that have a huge impact on business and society. It's madness to give these decisions to nitwits, and talented managers are not comfortable with either the pay rates in the public sector, nor are they anxious to adopt the reputation we give to public servants. It's a thankless job in many ways. The folks that whine about public agency performance, are the same ones that would raise even more he!! if you propose to offer compensation comparable to that in the private sector. So, public sector life is a lose/lose proposition.

These principles certainly struck me when I was a public servant. I made calculations and determinations that impacted basically every employer in my state. I took it seriously and folks (even industry folks) say I did a good job, but it seemed crazy to have so much responsibility placed on someone with only my skill.